Ontario Minister of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development David Piccini.Sammy Kogan/The Canadian Press
Ontario will expand insurance coverage to sick or injured workers above the age of 65 and increase the monetary benefits they can claim, as part of a series of reforms to the Workplace Safety and Insurance Board compensation system.
Specifically, Premier Doug Ford’s Progressive Conservative government will mandate WSIB to raise loss-of-earnings benefits, which cover income lost because of a work-related injury, from 85 per cent to 90 per cent of a worker’s take-home pay. The province’s Monday announcement marks the first such benefits increase since 1998. Ontario will also expand coverage to people over 65 who are still employed. Previously, this age group was not eligible for WSIB benefits.
“Ontario’s workforce is changing and the compensation system should reflect that,” David Piccini, the province’s Minister of Labour, Immigration, Training and Skills Development, said in an interview. “We know that workers are staying longer in the workforce, working well over the age of 65. We also know there has not been a pay increase for injured workers in a very long time,” he added.
These changes have long been campaigned for by the Ontario NDP, which introduced a bill last year – the Meredith Act – that aims to expand overall WSIB coverage and reduce the denial rates for those who sustain an injury or develop a disease on the job.
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Provincial legislators are set to vote on the bill on April 15, though the government is implementing its changes independently as part of changes to the existing Workplace Safety and Insurance Act.
The reforms will take effect as soon as legislative updates to the WSIA are passed.
More than 75 per cent of employers in Ontario across most sectors are mandated to pay WSIB premiums that cover employees in case of workplace illness or injury. Businesses such as banks, insurers, lawyers’ and doctors’ offices are exempt from participating, but can choose to. As of 2026, employer premiums were at $1.23 per $100 of payroll, the lowest rate in more than five decades.
For years, labour advocates have been critical of the scope of coverage, particularly the age cut-off of at 65, which effectively means that workers over that age who get injured on the job cannot collect monetary benefits while they are on leave.
According to a November, 2025, report from the Ontario Network of Injured Workers, a non-profit group, WSIB claims from workers 63 and older increased by 279 per cent between 1994 and 2024 to almost 17,000.
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Prior to 1990, Ontario’s worker compensation system paid out lifetime pensions to those who were permanently injured on the job, based on their disability level and income. A legislative change in 1990 capped payouts to workers 65 or under.
In the last three decades however, late retirements across the country have become more of a norm. In 2024, for the first time on record, the median retirement age exceeded 65, a sharp difference from 61.4 in 2004, according to a 2024 report from Statistics Canada. That same report showed that in 2022, 21 per cent of Canadians aged 65 to 74 were still employed. In Ontario alone, there are now approximately 400,000 people over 65 still in the workforce.
This is the second WSIB-related announcement made by the Ford government this month. Last week, the government extended WSIB coverage to 29,000 health workers, including nurses, personal support workers and residential care workers. It was a change that was being pushed for by healthcare unions and the Ontario Liberals, which had introduced private member bills six times in the last five years to expand WSIB coverage to care workers.
Mr. Piccini did not respond directly to a query about whether Progressive Conservative members of parliament will vote in favour of the NDP’s Meredith bill. The proposed new act is a broad-based bill that seeks to overhaul compensation rules and reshape how the system is funded.
For example, one clause in the bill targets the use of “paper” medical reviews. Currently, when a worker is injured on the job, a WSIB-retained doctor, who never sees the worker in person, can overturn an opinion from a local physician and deny a claim. The Meredith Act proposes that the second medical practitioner actually sees the worker in person.